The Baltic Pipe deadline ambitious but achievable

Business

(PAP) ej/jch May 28, 2018

The Polish government's commissioner for strategic energy infrastructure, Piotr Naimski, said that the 2022 deadline for building the Baltic Pipe gas pipeline is ambitious, but achievable. "We'll make it," he declared.

Naimski added that the current contract with Russia's Gazprom would certainly not be extended.

Naimski was asked on a private radio station about the Baltic Pipe project in relation to the signing in Copenhagen last Thursday of a co-financing agreement between the Polish and Danish gas transit operators and the EU's Innovation and Networks Executive Agency (INEA) for the pipeline's preparatory work.

"Everything is under control, we're exactly on course with the foreseen timetable, it's end is in 2022," Naimski said, asked about the chance of finishing the pipeline on schedule. "It is a very big investment undertaking, it costs a lot, it is a question of our security and future for many, many years," he continued, going on to state that, "the investment is economically justified, it's passed its economic tests." "Doubts proliferate that we'll make it. We'll make it," he stressed. "2022 is an ambitious deadline, but absolutely possible."

He also noted that through the Baltic Pipe and the Świnoujście gas port, Poland would be able to bring in as much gas as the country currently requires - 17 billion cubic metres a year. As a result, it will be free of Gazprom's price dictation. Piotr Naimski gave his assurance that the current contract with Gazprom would not be extended.